Chiff and Fipple Forums

After my first play on the blackwood flute for a week, I'm now convinced that the problem (or at least the significant problem, if there are any others out there) is indeed with the blackwood flute itself, and not some background noise from a condition that is there all the time. I'm still strugglin...

Given that it can happen with the resin head as well as the blackwood one, I wonder if trigeminal neuralgia might be a possibility? Thanks for that. I've had a quick look at what The Internet has to say about it. From what I can gather, it seems a little more random and general than the specific se...

Thanks again. To be honest, what happens with the Delrin flute is different enough for me to be unsure as to whether it is even a reaction or not. With that one, the sensation on the tongue feels like it could just be fatigue from maintaining a difficult (for me) embouchure. The taste I get from it ...

Thanks very much for this, Loren. Lots of really useful information there. I didn't think my tongue was picking up anything from licking my lips, as this was something I thought about when it first started happening and so I was on the lookout for it - but as you say, it could still be happening sub...

I would also look at your use of oil. Oils can act as a vehicle to transfer some otherwise inert wood factors to your mouth and lips. I personally experienced this while turning some cocobolo. I had previouly not had any reaction to the Cocobolo, but when I used some oil as a lubricant while boring...

I don't think I've ever played the delrin flute within a few hours (usually about a day) after playing the blackwood one. I always spend 10-15 minutes cleaning the blackwood one immediately after I finish playing it, then move on to do something non-flute-related. I'm still not sure what's going her...

Thanks so much, everyone, for taking the trouble to post all that helpful stuff. Things have maybe moved on a little in the few days since I first posted this, though, in that I stopped playing the blackwood flute, with the intention of confirming that it was the problem, and have only played the de...

Something else I should maybe have mentioned in the original post: The flute doesn't actually smell 'off' in any way - it smells of wood and almond oil. The taste comes after a few minutes of playing, and seems more like an 'effect', rather than an actual taste.

Thanks, all, for your contributions. I'm pretty sure this is related to the blackwood flute, rather than any medication or the like, and I have looked for correlation with food, drink and so on, to no avail. As with many intermittent problems, whether with software, machinery or the human body, it i...

I played the whistle (various ones, metal, plastic, but no wood) for donkeys' years before I took up the flute. I also have a delrin flute that I originally bought to practice with a different embouchure, but this now comes in useful to alternate the days with my blackwood one. It seems to help if I...

I've been playing a blackwood flute for about 4 years now, and I love it to bits. However, for the last year or so, on and off, I've had a bit of a problem in the form of a bitter taste, and a slight numbness, that develops on the tip of my tongue. It's difficult to be sure, but it seems to originat...